1. She wept when she saw me laughing and joking,
How can a night be beautiful without the moon’s light?

2. The sky of beauty is not alluring,
Until the stars of flowers blossom in it.

3. The night of youth pained at its end,
Does the gloom of night last without the magic of dawn?

4. The dawn fears how long it will last,
While my fear and for it are the consequence of fate.

5. She said you’ve grown old and nothing remains,
Of the pact between us since you grew up.

6. She denied the beauty spot on her cheek,
From me, though on the cheek of time it still grew.

7. Many dreams and knowledge are adorned with folly,
The joy of the branch is only in blossom and fruit.

8. My whims blamed me though they were liars,
Many a whim is sweeter than triumph.

9. A young man's joy may do him wrong some day,
What purity in this world exists without anguish?

10. If the days of old age poisoned his life,
Then long live the pleasures of his early days.

11. You have been blessed with the beauty of your youth,
Though blessing may sometimes come like rain.

12. How soon you hasten to estrangement and desolation,
What we shall encounter from fate is enough.

13. Sorrow leaves clear traces in the heart,
No good comes from sorrow that leaves no trace.

14. My patience was shredded by time,
Cut down like foliage by the sharp sword.

15. Many a night of union has its visitor depart,
While our fate brings separation in its stead.

16. A garden of grief with jasmine smells,
In the eyes of light, it rains teardrops from it.

17. If at dawn twilight gathered the pearls
Scattered on its borders, they would not disperse.

18. The threads of beauty wove over it,
That coolness which resembles raindrops.

19. In it the rays of the rising sun sipped,
A wine whose cup the moon lights up at dawn.

20. Strewn about it fades yellow out of awe,
While meadow saffron has the fragrance of ambergris.

21. Whenever the night grew still, nestling us,
I erased what the wind wrote in the sands.

22. Until dawn cast its veil upon it
And the elderly morning chattered about my chastity.

23. May he live whom my tears pleased and I spilled,
My ears heed no blame in shedding them.

24. I yearn for him yet I fear in loving him,
A spear of affection or a sword of loving gaze.

25. An onlooker whose eyes inflamed mine,
And thoughts that stirred passions in my mind.

26. Boon companions of literature whose lips
Quenched the thirst that homeland and journey left.

27. Radiant white when they rode at night to ruins,
I saw them in the distance, moons and shining stars.

28. When we gathered in an assembly of guidance and wisdom,
It was enough to recall Ta'abbata Sharran’s poetry at nightfall.